Posted
by
timothy
on Thursday July 17, 2008 @06:28PM
from the little-timmy's-law-against-all-things-that-are-bad dept.

An anonymous reader writes "It seems that ISPs have gathered together with 45 attorney generals and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) to form an agreement to crush child pornography. What does that mean? Probably the same as it meant for RoadRunner, Sprint, AT&T and Verizon customers — the end of the newsgroups." Here's the back-patting press-release from the various parties who signed on (the National Cable & Telecommunications Association, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, and the National Association of Attorneys General), though the actual text of the agreement does not seem to have been made public.

I disagree. I think they need to increase their efforts to stop the online distribution of child pornography. There are many sites that have been claimed by some to contain at least some child pornography - rapidshare, myspace, facebook, photobucket, etc; and these should be blocked as well. But even that isn't doing enough if they were to look at the larger ways of distribution. Email, FTP and HTTP have all been used in to distribute child pornography, and if the ISPs were committed to blocking child pornography, they would block those as well. That would only leave a few other things that would need to be blocked to stop child pornography - instant messaging, telnet and a few others. You say they are taking away legitimate purposes of newsgroups, but they are still leaving so many ways of getting child pornography -- so clearly you are a glass is half full and not half empty type of person, and in cases like this, that makes it seem like you are in favor of an internet part full of child pornography.

...that makes it seem like you are in favor of an internet part full of child pornography.

Speaking personally, I am so fed up with the censorship, fear and repression taking place in our society in the name of fighting child pornography; that I would personally prefer to see an internet half full of child pornography before I see any more rollbacks of freedom along the lines this "Agreement".

The child porn excuse has long since lost its ability to outrage me into accepting even quite minor restrictions on liberties. Unfortunately, the general public seems so eager to become apoplectic that media outlets have essentially created an industry around giving people their daily outrage "fix". It's like Soma [wikipedia.org], except instead of making them happy all the time, they just get angry/outraged.

The effect is the same however, as people allow their emotions to overcome their reason, and we lose all ability to object or hold any kind of reasoned debate. It's like a Mass Panic, but in slow motion. Best to run with the herd, lest you get trampled.

You ain't kiddin', brother. In my Intro to Civil and Criminal Procedures class a few weeks ago, the professor started a discussion about the Supreme Court decision overturning the death penalty for child molesters. Almost every single one of those future lawyers (at least one of whom is a cop!) starting shouting about "protecting the children". I don't think I've seen anything like it. These are people training to someday work with the law (OK, not all of them will go on to law school, or pass the bar if they do, but still you'd think they're all thinking adults), and they immediately jumped to "for the children".

I felt like a lone voice calling out for restraint in not wanting to give the state ever more reasons to execute its citizens. It's easy to forget that not everyone in our society is able to think calmly and dispassionately about things like this.

And for the record, I have kids, and absolutely want them protected from the predations of child molesters. I also want them protected from the predations of the government; balancing those two isn't easy, but nothing worthwhile ever is.

Oh my... Sorry but you get this one. Now, according to the law as practiced and the spirit of the law... Are people given capital punishment because their crime was so grievous that it deserved it according to the "people" (or at least their representatives) or is the death penalty used in cases where the claim is they want to prevent the person from harming additional people in the future? (Please answer 'cause I have some VERY hated statistics for you though you may not hate them, some do, as they're rather *cough*....

Actually I will just list them now. Irony? I think so... Considering that people who murder people actually sometimes get light sentences and in many rural areas a child sexual offense really only gets the offender a slap on the wrist the first time unless there's a history of it. (Yeah, when my daughter was molested I did some research.)

Anyhow... Use the D.O.J.'s site and happily compile the statistics anyway you want. There are two groups lowest on the list for recidivism. They are murders and sex offenders. The media would have you believe that is some incurable evil brain malfunction for either case but then go holy batshit if someone actually tried to use insanity as a plea for either. Murderers and Sex Offenders are less likely to re-offend than any other criminals. A robber will go back to prison. A drug dealer will go back to prison. A fighter will go back to prison.

What are we really talking about here? The few ISPs left in the US that still have news servers? Blocking NNTP? What? All these guys predicting the end of Usenet don't seem to have the vaguest idea how it functions, and seem to assume that if some big-time ISPs shutdown their news servers that the whole edifice will come crashing down.

Give your heads a collective shake. Usenet's not going anywhere. It may mean that those few people who still get a free ride from their ISPs will have to pay, but so the

Prostitution isn't a victimless crime. It could be, and sometimes is, but the general case is that it's gross exploitation and if you're looking for a victim, the prostitute is it. Sometimes a student or someone will make a money by selling themselves for sex. That's their choice. But for most prostitutes, the circumstances are so bad that you can't really apply the word "choice" any more. The reality of prostitution is a grim one and more complicated than someone making a decision to trade sex for money - it's surrounded by and part of a whole mesh of other crimes and abuses. I don't know about the USA, but the plight of immigrant girls from Eastern Europe forced into prostitution not just in countries like Turkey (where the slang term for prostitute is "a Russian") but even here in the UK, is widespread and as nasty as it gets.

We can debate the nature of the laws on prostitution, as well as how and when they are applied, but to consider prostitution to be a victimless crime and that the objection to it is founded in Christian puritanism, is except in a few cases, wrong. It may be that the puritanical attitudes that accompany Christianity and Islam make the situation worse for prostitutes in defining it as a shameful activity, but, although I think trading your body for money is usually damaging for reasons far more fundamental than any religion our species has evolved, it's a separate debate. If you want to see the victim in prostitution she (or he) is right there in front of you.

Solution, bring it above board, regulate it, unionise it.
Bring it out of the back rooms and seedy motels and give the girls some decent protection.
Take the fucking control away from pimps and organised crime and you fix most of the problem.

What the government did to the author was really pretty horrible. Here's a commentary about his death:

THE MURDER OF PETER MCWILLIAMS

An Indictment, Not an Obituary

Peter McWiliams, 50, best selling author, poet, photographer, publisher, libertarian crusader, medical marijuana activist, AIDS patient and cancer survivor, was found dead on the floor of his bathroom, apparently having choked to death after vomiting, for want of medical marijuana.

There will be an autopsy, but whatever the immediate cause of death may have been, he was murdered by the United States Government as surely as if they shot him. Indeed, it would have been much more humane if they had just put a bullet in his head. No one should have to go through what he suffered at the hands of his country.

When I learned of his death yesterday, I was too angry to write about it. Even now, this is being written more in anger than in sorrow. Peter is where they can't hurt him anymore, but his murderers are still at large, and if there is anything that Peter would want, it would be for us to continue to speak the truth to power, to tyranny.

Of course, if Peter did choke after vomiting it would be directly the result of his having been denied the right to use medical marijuana. Peter was a part of the roughly 40% of those patients for whom the anti-viral drugs being used to treat AIDS can cause violent nausea. The government knew this from direct observation. During at least one court appearance he vomited into a wastebasket during the hearing.

Dealing with this nausea is one of the best documented uses of medical marijuana, and he had also used it during cancer chemotherapy, when he actually gained weight.

None of that mattered to the judge. None of that mattered to the prosecutor. After all, these are the same people who had held him in federal detention for months on a $250,000 bail, even though he posed no flight risk, the only justification for such a high bail.

Had he wanted to flee, he had plenty of time to do so before he was charged, but he is a world famous writer, so he could not hide. His publishing company was there in Los Angeles, and he was taking expensive anti-virals for AIDS. He really could not flee, but that did not prevent the government from violating his Constitutional rights.

Consider the lengths to which they went to keep him from raising the bail.

When his elderly mother pledged her house as security for the bail, they threatened that the government would seize her house if her son simply failed a drug test, not just if he were to flee. She would not be intimidated, but now her son is dead as the result of the conditions of the bail. These are the "family values" of America's war on the sick and dying.

See: "The federal prosecutor personally called my mother to tell her that if I was found with even a trace of medical marijuana, her house would be taken away." -- Peter McWilliams

Your hair splitting of saying that "prostitution" is victimless, is contentious at best. The activity of prostitution has a victim 999 times out of a 1000. By all means tell me about the girl you know who cheerfully sells sex and is perfectly well adjusted and doesn't need to do so, but I don't know of such cases myself.

To say that something is a victimless crime is to say that the criminal is harming, at most, him- or herself by committing it. It does not say anything one way or the other about whether the criminal is simultaneously a victim of some other crime. If A extorts B into committing the crime of prostitution then A is the ultimate criminal, and B is both a victim and a criminal. However, the crime that B commits has no victim, and thus shouldn't be considered a crime in the first place.

If they're choosing to do it -- and it is a choice, whatever you may think of the alternatives

I am really sorry to say that you are wrong. There are girls... who are kept prisoner and sold against their will... who have been told that their families will be punished if they try to escape. To call that a choice and to say that they should pursue an alternative is unfair.

Every action is a choice. It's not always a free choice, but it is a choice nonetheless. I did not say that they should pursue an alternative; you are assuming that calling it a choice implies looking down on them for making that choice, where no such slight was intended. What I said was that what they chose to do was the best alternative they knew of given their circumstances, including the threats and force others have used against them, and that if you (or anyone else) wants to change their lives for the better you need to change those circumstances, in this case by protecting them from these threats, because just outlawing the behavior can only make their situation worse than it already is.

I think we agree, really, except for the part where I consider prostitution, a victimless crime, to be separate from kidnapping and extortion, which both have clear victims. If someone is forced into prostitution due to someone else's crime of kidnapping and/or extortion then they are a victim of those crimes, not a victim of prostitution itself. If anything, prostitution performed under duress is even less eligible for the label "criminal" than the same action chosen freely.

A picture of a naked child is not a sexualised image to anyone but a paedophile. All of this media beat up crap about it being "irresponsible" on the behalf of the artist(s) because "of what paedophiles do with such images" is further perpetrating the viewpoint that a naked child is a sexual entity. You can't hold someone as immoral when you're espousing their own position.

Look at it this way: there are some people for whom stuffed toys are their fetish. Should we be calling for the banning of Sesame Street for its irresponsible pandering?

It's funny: if you replace the words 'child pornography' with 'Scientology documents', you can roll this line of reasoning right back to when Helena Kobrin tried to rmgroup alt.religion.scientology. (I really recommend look up the newsgroup on Wikipedia, it's fascinating Internet history.)

Like filtering Bittorrent, a real reason for dropping the alt.* hierarchy is doubtless bandwidth. When I last looked some years ago, there were over 70,000 alt.* newsgroups, most of which had no traffic except spam, and some of which were meerely names to create ASCII art in the list of newsgroups. And the binary groups with the most traffic tended to be porn. So since people can download porn on their own fairly easily now, why should the ISP's take responsibility for such an expensive resource to maintain? Blocking child pornography hasn't been an excuse for over a decade, since 'NNTP-Posting-Host' became a de facto required field from all NNTP service providers.

Most of the ISP's I've seen mentioned are only dumping alt.*, not all of Usenet, which still has a lot of useful discussion groups. The Google archives of such groups are wonderful for obscure technical help, and some of the groups remain quite useful for technical discussions or social networking. Dumping those freely created and awkward to flush newsgroups, as a matter of policy, seems to make good business sense and needn't be burdened with the excuse of child pornography.

a reasonable argument, except that if a user is downloading his porn from an isp's newsserver, its basically at no cost to the isp ( no upstream bandwidth is used ).
If they remove the newsserver, and the user then switches to bt/http/whatever, that *will* cost the isp upstream bandwidth costs, so from that economic point of view, its cheaper to maintain the servers.
A more likely reason is culpability and fear of lawsuits / criminal investigations for hosting illegal stuff- yes, I know safe harbour provisions, but there are arguements that could be made based on individual groups as seperate channels. I don't know if it would stand up, but I bet the ISP wouldn't want to pay their defence attourneys the cost of finding out...

as an aside, I suppose an economic argument could be made based around the usage patterns of heavy downloaders, the typical retention of ISP newsservers ( and the subsequent need for upstream fill servers ), and the relative inefficiency of nntp as a binary distribution protocol ( even with yenc ), but that is really just an argument against having a *bad* isp news server - disc space is cheap.

Why do I have the feeling that all this will do is block many websites and services that have nothing to do with child pornography, inconveniencing thousands of innocent web users, while the paedophiles find new ways to trade child porn and are barely inconvenienced? I'm all for fighting child porn, but blocking individual websites or newsgroups is clearly not working, and blocking vast chunks of websites and newsgroups is going to result in blocking mostly legitimate content. Would it be too much to ask for these organisations to actually focus their resources on catching the paedophiles for once? I'm not even sure which is worse in society - a paedophile with child porn, or a paedophile who can't get hold of child porn but wants to see naked children...

"I hate to say it, but the web has outlived it's usefulness anyway. Any idiot can create a website, Any idiot can post anonymously and any idiot can freely distribute kiddie porn as a result. Let's face it, the web is an outdated system that is primarily abused. Anything accomplished on the web can be done elsewhere faster, cheaper and better. Sure, the pedo crowd can still find ways to trade, but the web makes it too easy to hook up. Killing the web won't kill kiddie porn, but it makes it more difficult. Does anyone really give a crap if the web disappears? Seriously?"

Just replace "usenet", "the web", with just about any networking technology and your statement still has the same meaning. Where does it end?

Killing usenet won't kill kiddie porn, but it makes it more difficult.

But it wouldn't protect any children, it would just make their plight less publicized. The children that are in child pornography pictures are being abused (obviously)The people abusing them are not the one viewing them on the web, but are the people taking the pictures. It is the children that we are trying to protect here isn't it? Ending the distribution of pictures does nothing to stop the real life abuse. It's just sweeping the problem under the rug. Attacking distribution instead of production shows that the protection of children comes second to the punishing of the pedophile. While protecting the actual children being abused would seem to be a higher moral priority, it isn't as media savvy/lucrative as simply chasing the pedophiles. Look at things like "To Catch a Predator" or the FBI's fake hyperlinks. [imod.co.za] Did they save a single child? No there was never any actual child danger. How often do you hear about an actual child being saved from sexual abuse vs hearing about the arrest of someone with downloaded kiddie porn? Yes the two crimes are related, but shouldn't we be focusing on the root problem (child abuse) instead of just treating the symptoms (online kiddie porn)

Attacking distribution instead of production shows that the protection of children comes second to the punishing of the pedophile.

The theory is called "demand reduction".

The idea is that most child pornography is produced overseas where US authorities have no jurisdiction, and by locking up child pornography "patrons" the demand for CP will do down and therefore less children will be abused overseas.

I am not defending this theory, I am merely presenting it. I will say that very little child pornography is produced in the USA.

I agree with some of your logic. But not all 'child pornography' involves any abuse of children. Take this article about a grocery store refusing to make a birthday cake with a baby picture of a 21 year old man for his birthday, because the child was naked. (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1029375/Asda-refuse-print-baby-snap-son-21st-birthday-cake--hes-naked.html).

And for someone fascinated by children, women, men, or exciting panoramas of cornfields, there are plenty of innocent pictures collected and published that might be exciting if organized and published together. So please do not assume that all 'child pornography' actually involves any mishandling of children.

"any visual depiction, including any photograph, film, video, picture, or computer or computer-generated image or picture, whether made or produced by electronic, mechanical, or other means, of sexually explicit conduct, where -

(A) the production of such visual depiction involves the use of a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct;
(B) such visual depiction is, or appears to be, of a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct;
(C) such visual depiction has been created, adapted, or modified to appear that an identifiable minor is engaging in sexually explicit conduct; or
(D) such visual depiction is advertised, promoted, presented, described, or distributed in such a manner that conveys the impression that the material is or contains a visual depiction of a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct . .."

No what is even worse is the fact that they don't even have to be children and it can still be considered child porn:

(B) such visual depiction is, or appears to be, of a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct;

If I understand correctly it is enough if the person in the film happens to look too young and whilist I agree that intentionally trying to make a film look like child porn is a bit weird it still shouldn't be a crime if every person in the film is an adult.

Besides in my oppinion it's still preferable for somebody to watch "fake" child porn than the real stuff and having this fake stuff available legally could even cut down the number of those who want to watch real child porn.

if the magazine bills itself as showing girls who are of age ("legal") and shows girls who look too young, but ARE of age, than it "appears" legal.

however if the magazine uses those same girls, who ARE of age, but CLAIMS them to be too young, then they "appear" illegal.

basically, as long as you don't claim anywhere that the people portrayed are too young, and there is nothing in the picture to imply it, and you DO claim visibly that they ARE old enough (and they in fact are) then all appearances are satisfied.

I think that is more what the law is addressing. it allows them to prosecute where there is no way to determine the age of the person in question, but where it is obvious that things are not intended to be legal.

Back on the main topic though, my concern with such things isn't the blocking of child porn (personally I think that would be a very good thing), it's the possibility of "collateral damage" to innocent sites, and worse yet, "feature creep" where they decide that once they have child porn they'll block pirating, then normal porn, then anyone having a cigarette in a photo, then anyone who disagrees with them on any grounds, etc... (classic slippery slope) and once you get to that point you can't fight any of it without being labelled as a lover of child pornography.

Don't forget that you'd also be supporting Al-Queda and be figuratively spitting in the faces of the America troops. Anything that sparks fear in the simple minded and shame into those who dare to think otherwise.

Sadly, views like yours will be considered paranoid, until of course they come to fruition, but by then you've already been labelled a communist and no one will listen to you anyway.

Wow. I usually don't think much. Really. I just sit, post, respond, etc... Seldom do I think deeply. Your post made me do so. The vast majority of people here on/. imply that they believe a law that doesn't suit the good of the masses is unjust (some just think that if they don't like it than it is unjust) and believe that those laws should be repealed or changed in the manner that suits their various agendas. So, well, I've seen my State's SOR web site. There are a GREAT many people on it - which is even more amazing given the fairly tolerant place where I live and the very low crime rates in the State of Maine. We can conjecture that there are those who enjoy child pornography (and I'd like to hope that this is a conversation we can have without accusing the parent of being pro-anything) and we can even debate the meaning of child pornography. (I've come across what would probably be termed pornographic material where they simply claim it is art, I do think it was closer to art but some judges would likely consider it to be pornographic simply because it contained under-aged people at nudist camps and the images contained age ranges from near birth to near death.) So, to the discussion that needs having by people more involved. There are only those people who get caught for numbers, I'd am pretty sure that the ratio would be a much higher percent than there are of, say, the 5% figure often used by the homosexual group. They are a group with little representation and yet we grant them additional rights and protections - they're a minority so to speak. It wasn't that long ago in our own American society where you could wed at the age of 12. Hell, in some states you still can. So, if this is a law and the people breaking it aren't stupid but are doing what they feel comes natural to them then do the actual regulations and laws need a revision or a repeal?

If is my understanding from way too many bad movies, internet chats, television shows, and some thinking on my own that maybe we're defining an age as something meaningful. Is a 21 year old capable of drinking safely? Is he more safe to drink at that age than any other? When is a human ready to make the choice to engage in sexual activity with a person of their choosing. In Maine, my State, you can have sex with a 16 year old female. All day long. You can't take a picture of her nude, she can't live with you and send out a lewd picture of herself using your computer, if she sends you nude images you're committing a crime, and more... Who is the judge? The law that suddenly went out and said that 18 is the magic number?

The worst part about this is the media instilled phobias now, "Oh he's looked at children nude online. Studies show he will be jumping out of trees and raping toddlers with a baseball bat, so we'd better ban him from being within however many feet of a place where a child live or plays or go to school so that we keep them safe." (While they're forcing them to live on the outskirts of town, has limited access to the services he needs to prevent becoming a recidivism statistic, or forcing him to not register at all and then become an unknown risk.)

I have a daughter who was molested by an older cousin. Trust me when I say we have no love for child abuse in our family. (She was five, he was 17.) There are some obvious cases where a child is harmed. Can we successfully make a person wait until the magic age of 18 before having sex? No? Why not? How about because they are naturally curious. Can we stop a man from liking a well developed teen aged girl? Of course not and I don't care HOW much you want to lie to me (not you personally parent post) you too are going to appreciate beautiful females. When you see a fantastic looking woman while out shopping, when you get close enough so that you can see she is even more beautiful, when you get there and see by her face or mannerisms that she is probably underage you do not (I suspect) suddenly feel awful. I suspect you get a few more thoughts about innocence, beauty, and

Wow, a little cultural bias here, huh? Just because a girl isn't fat or is "petite" (small frame) or does not have a size D cup (the mega-uberus Americans like so much) does not make her 10. That's fucking ridiculous! It just shows what a sorry sex life you had when you were 18 - or what fat girls you were fucking. Fucking fat girls is all right - if that's what you like, that's what you like. Just don't put your self up in the moral evolution ladder and dictate that all girls should look like what you fanc

This is slightly off-topic, but Genarlow Wilson was a 17-year old high school football player who received consensual oral sex from a 15-year old girl and was sentenced to prison for 10 years for aggravated child molestation. He received several scholarship offers and was an excellent student. (Source) [go.com]

There are also many stories of 16/17 year olds exchanging nude photos of each other and being charged with child pornography. (Source) [cnet.com]

I think kiddie porn (pics of young children) is absolutely disgusting and people seeking it need serious psychiatric help, but our laws need to distinguish between those looking to exploit children and kids that are just sending pictures of themselves over the internet without realizing the consequences.

What's disturbing here is that they include "computer generated images." For every computer generated image or drawing of child pornography that is taken away, actual child pornography will be made to replace it. Artistic expressions depicting child pornography should most certainly not be considered illegal. If you don't like it, don't look for it - but as long as no children are harmed in the making of it, WHAT THE FUCK IS THE PROBLEM? The very next step is to consider artistic depictions or negative views of our beloved corporations and/or government to be illegal.

Another one of my pet peeves: I hate when people and groups (*cough* religious groups) try to enforce their ideals upon others. God forbid they would use words, instead they always try to twist the government's arm to enforce their ideals upon the world. This is taking place within this argument, but also can be clearly seen with video game/movie ratings, abortion, and drugs. I have my own ideals and my own concious. I can decide for myself what I think is right and wrong. If you disagree, that's fine. If you can convince me to change my mind on a matter (drug use, abortion. I invite you.), that's excellent. When you are an old fuck who has nothing better to do then enforce your uneducated oppinions on others through violence (that would be allowing the police to raid one's property and seize whatever they need), here's a big FUCK YOU to you. Have a nice day.

I've watched a few episodes of cops where, after raiding a crack den or whatever, the cops then pose as the dealers and do a sting on everyone who buys the product. It seems like it should be similar here--raid the servers, and identify the clientÃle.

But the REALLY important thing, and I do mean the REALLY important thing, is to trackdown and rescue the exploited children. I'm okay with punishing people for participating in the distribution process; however, the reason we view it as so despicable is because of the value we place on the children involved, and our primary efforts should certainly be directed toward finding the source of child porn vs. find the recipients.

I'm not even sure which is worse in society - a heterosexual with porn, or a heterosexual who can't get hold of porn but wants to see naked women...

Do you see the flaw now?

As a pedophile, I am sick and fucking tired of being stuck in a corner among the sickest imaginable because of urges I can't control. I didn't fucking ask to like little girls; I just do. It's just one of my idiosyncrasies. I don't kidnap, rape, or molest children, nor do I ever plan to, and I have an entirely constructive relationship with the children I do come in contact with. Surprise! The vast majority of pedophiles are rational human beings, just like you. The man in the white van who offers you candy is a psychotic; the exception, not the rule.

Please, cooperate with me here. The only way to get this demonizing bullshit to stop is by changing the general mindset of pedophile = sick child raping motherfucker.

Wow, I really commend for having the balls to come out and say that. A bunch of my irc buddies are pedophiles/lolicons, and they would love to see this post.

And, yes, you're right. while there is some intersection between pedophiles and child molesters, it is nowhere near a majority. If you want to see how ridiculous this seems, replace 'pedophile' with 'straight male' and child with 'woman'. You end up with "straight male = sick woman raping motherfucker". Sure, some straight males ARE sick woman raping motherfuckers, but that doesn't mean they all are. It's normal for someone to have strange urges and desires; there's nothing inherently wrong with liking little girls. It's not until you destructively act on those desires that it becomes a problem.

Something like 10% or 25% of males are attracted to extremely young girls based on genetics. I forget the figure; it's something lowish but not negligible like 1%.

Walk down the street one time when school's getting out and just glance around. Notice there's lots of young girls?... Notice they're young, curvy, smooth, and--best of all--bleeding youthful playfulness from every pore? Yeah, they're 13. They have tits, among other things. Oddly enough, the health and sexual energy of sexually matured youth

He was saying he doesn't have any desire to actually have sex with them, you fucking jackass. He's honest with people. The flaw in your statement that "straight male" = "male who will probably have sex with one or more women during the course of his life". So, continuing your analogy, "pedophile" = "person who will probably have sex with one or more children during the course of his lifetime" has one fatal flaw: most men only have sex with women able to give proper consent. There are such things as half-decent pedophiles; some of my best friends on the internet fall under this category. You know what the difference between a pedophile and a child molester is? Restraint. Sure, the pedophile might fantasize about that stuff, but the molester MAKES it happen, regardless of the law or the wants and needs of the child. Don't ever think that just because someone is attracted to children that that makes them a scumbag.

You and about 12% of the male population in North America according to the only study I've ever read. I don't sympathize personally, but we've already spent the better part of human history demonizing men who like other men and women who like other women. Those obviously couldn't be consensual either. Even consensual anal intercourse between a man and a woman is or has recently been illegal in many states.

How is that relevant? Knee-jerk reactions to issues based on a gut feeling are not always the best way to determine legal outcomes of peoples' thoughts or feelings.

Good studies have shown time and again that there is no definite link between the viewing of underage pornography and the abuse of children by that viewer, but because they get turned on by something we lump them in as molestors.

Here's one that really gets me -- technically a pedophile is only someone who gets aroused by pre-pubescent children, but viewing of 17 yr olds who are supermodels (yes, many professional adult looking models are under 18) engaged in sexually explicit conduct qualifies as viewing child pornography.

So next time you all say 'think of the children' remember these laws are about you when you were 17 checking out that picture of your naked 17 yr old girlfriend. Yes, that's child pornography too.

Troll much? A pedophile is one who is sexually attracted to children. Where does it say "views movies of other people raping little children"? I'm a heterosexual man and I like to view naked women. Does that mean I want to watch one get raped?

You are what you do, not what you think about. Please chill out with the prejudice.

Egg collectors in the UK (an illegal activity in this country) used to correspond to each other through the snail-mail system, referring to each other as No.2, No.7 etc.. Music fans would exchange bootleg tapes of concerts. Anyone trading digital files will probably end up exchanging memory cards/sticks under the guise of an mom'n'pop shop.

It has been illegal to take the eggs of most wild birds since the Wild Birds Protection Act 1954 and it is illegal to possess or control any wild birds' eggs taken since that time under the Wildlife and Countryside Act.

It is illegal to sell any wild bird's egg, irrespective of its age.

Possession of wild birds' eggs is an offence of strict liability so that anyone who chooses to be in possession of eggs is obliged to show, on a balance of probabilities, that their possession is lawful. The

To me, it sounds like the ISPs have agreed to turn off web sites that NCMEC complains about. They will "use NCMEC's list of active websites identified as containing child pornography, to ensure that no such site is hosted on servers owned or controlled by those companies." This is to "enforce their terms of service, all of which forbid the hosting of such illegal materials on their servers." In other words, sites are going to be turned off based on NCMEC's say so. Thus they look good for turning off sites that are illegal (think of the children!), and NCMEC gets the power they want.

From TFA:

Specifically, the cable companies have agreed to use NCMEC's list of active websites identified as containing child pornography, to ensure that no such site is hosted on servers owned or controlled by those companies. The companies will also report these instances to NCMEC's CyberTipline and where appropriate revise their policies around other potential sources of child pornography, such as, for example, newsgroups.

The agreement with NCMEC will provide cable broadband service providers with an invaluable source of information to help them enforce their terms of service, all of which forbid the hosting of such illegal materials on their servers. The information provided by NCMEC to cable service providers will also help them identify instances of child pornography, facilitating their reporting of such material to NCMEC as required by federal law. This in turn enables NCMEC to refer these cases to law enforcement for investigation and prosecution.

Because that's all control measures ever accomplish. The sad thing is what this is actually a step toward: it's a measure against pornography in general. People already miscategorize "pedophilia" as it is and the anti-porn people know they do that and encourage the misuse of the term so that they can advantage their puritan agendas.

I've been reading usenet for 15 years, I've never seen any child porn. Do I just not frequent the right groups?

Well, there's your problem.

<Cypher>...there's way too much information to decode the Usenet. You get used to it, though. Your brain does the translating. I don't even see the code. All I see is blonde, brunette, double-penetration MILF, redhead...</Cypher>

"Check out the alt.binaries.pictures.erotica hierarchy sometime -- there are some groups with very suspicious-looking names.
(alt.binaries.pictures.erotica.child? Gee, I wonder what that could contain?)"

I agree... it likely contains "thousands of SPAM messages".

Do you honestly believe that pedophiles are that open about their openly illegal activities?

YOU are off you rocker if you believe that child porn is a "problem" in our society.

While certainly repugnant, I don't see how BANNING all the.alt.binaries newsgroups is going to help stop child porn.

I've been on Usenet for well over a decade, and I also have never seen child porn.

It's total knee jerk emotional hysteria, and you sir are are being used as a "tool" to censor the internet.

I hate child pornograpy as much as anyone SHOULD, but I know whats a PR stunt that wont solve a thing and will only reduce internet's freedom to share information in exchange for absolutly nothing at all whatsoever.

How can we convey to the public that the internet's value depends directly on ISP's not being able to discriminate traffic by content?

How can we put out there the idea that the internet has all this potential for individual freedom and that any kind of attempt to enforce any kind of legal stuff in it will only hinder the potential it has FOR THE COMMON JOE?

Maybe the first stage would be to convince the Common Joe that his privacy actually matters to him? People don't seem to CARE about privacy or liberty any more, and I worry that nobody will notice their freedoms being stolen until its too late, as has happened so many times before in history...

The Common Joe wants to be able to pry, poke and be privy to the personal and intimate details of his neighbors, his employer/employees, his local representatives and clergy, friends, enemies, teenagers, celebrities, politicians, historical figures, and especially his spouse. He wants access to all this information so that he can can gleefully pour over it all in the confines of his basement.

This is what people actually want. If you need any further proof beyond the dist

Oh, they care as soon as it is THEIR "privacy" that is infringed. Just like they care if it is THEIR "free speech rights" or THEIR "liberty" that are infringed.

You have the right to privacy as long as you don't have anything to hide. You have the right to free speech as long as you don't say anything that will offend me. You have the right to liberty as long as you don't do anything that offend me.

And what always fascinates me the most is how so many people can't see what is wrong with the previous paragrap

They'll have minimal impact on the perverts, but no doubt they'll get a chance to tighten the screws on the rest of us. Which is, of course, what it's all about.

And I certainly wouldn't be comfortable with anything the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children has its fingerprints on. It's been caught phonying up statistics and acting in a manner that could best be described as "self-serving" on more than one occasion.

Being that a "pervert" is someone who practices "perversion" which is "those types of human behavior that are perceived to be a serious deviation from what is considered to be orthodox or normal." That is, not just sexual.

But hey, there's plenty of sexual behavior that is "perverted" which makes most Americans blush (like that's hard), and there's lots of people that would love to "tighten the screws" on those practitioners also.

There's an interesting thread at dsl reports [dslreports.com] where some bell south customers point out:
1. many news groups still exist for the purpose of porn, they just aren't named alt.bin*
2. many news groups still exist with porn, erotica, sex, etc in their names.
Yesterday, I fired up Pan on att yahoo to survey the damage.
The posters were right, and there were many groups left. There were also posts in them from the last few days.

If this is going to shutdown the newsgroups, it is a semi-clever ploy to curb piracy... disguised as a "think of the children" scenario. I always enjoyed getting what warez I do grab from my ISPs hosted newsgroups, because unlike something like bittorrent, it is my ISP that is in fact "making available". Since there are actual legitimate (though very few nowadays) reasons for the existence of Usenet, they can't just turn it off. Instead, they give the world a bleeding heart story, while the RIAA and the likes line the pockets of these people.

When you announce censorship to stop piracy, everybody gets up in arms about net neutrality.

When you instead use child pornography as your scapegoat, the majority will turn a blind eye to your censorship efforts.

Note that the first thing to go was alt.* on usenet, a large source of piracy. If they had choked off alt.* because of piracy, there would have been much talk about net neutrality. Since they did it because of child pornography, nobody mentions net neutrality.

We had one of our ISPs cave to something similar. So I wrote this letter to the marketing director: (pardon the asterisks)

Dear Steve Jackson

I'm writing to express my concern over ******'s introduction of website filtering. I believe this sets a disturbing precedent for the continuing provision of internet services by *****.An ISP's role is not to regulate what I can use my internet connection for. An ISP's role is to provide me with an internet connection, which **** has been excellent at doing.The aim of 'stopping objectionable practices' is a noble one. However, problems soon become apparent when one considers that my interpretation of objectionable behaviour is undoubtedly different from *****'s interpretation. The logical conclusion to this line of reasoning, is that at some point in the future when I want to use my internet connection for something, **** will decide that it knows best, and stop me from so doing.This quote from David Lane (Director of Society For Promotion Of Community Standards Inc.) is particularly disturbing: "... [The society] wants the filtering extended beyond child porn content to include the blocking of all hard core pornographty sites and those promoting "objectionable" content defined in secion 3(2)(a-f) of the Films, Videos and Publications Classification Act 1993 (sexual violence, bestiality, etc).".It illustrates the problem rather well. I have used the internet for pornography, and I don't expect to be blocked from doing so in the future. If I look at pornography more hardcore than the limits imposed on free-to-air television, this doesn't make my behaviour 'wrong', and I certainly don't expect **** to impose its standards on my behaviour. If I do something illegal, then that's relevant for the Police, not a coporation.Additionally, the concept that a list maintained by the Internal Affairs Office will be capable of cataloguing all objectionable sites on the internet is flawed if not outright hilarious.There are various software packages available which attempt to keep the internet 'safe' for younger users. I am sure that, combined with actual parenting, these tools are far better suited to keeping children from accessing inappropriate content.I should take this moment to clarify that my primary concern is not that I may soon be unable to access pornography with my **** account. Instead, I believe that once this form of filtering has been introduced for one honourable reason, it will only be a matter of time before the practice of filtering is extended to other aspects of the internet.It is widely publicized (although not necessarily accurate) that 'peer to peer' (p2p) services consume a disproportionate amount of bandwidth accross the internet as a whole. I extend from this assumption that some time in the future **** may be in favour of blocking p2p services in order to extract more customers from the same amount of bandwidth. This would have a real and noticeable affect on my internet behaviour.There are other scenarios in which **** might decide to filter my internet use. For example, I'm sure **** wants to retain their customers, and so logically it would be a sensible idea to block all competing ISP's websites. Or, if there is a damning report about ***** on a news website, it would be very easy to block any user from accessing that website.I'm not suggesting that **** does or would do any of these measures, but the only way I can be certain of this is for **** not to regulate my internet behaviour in any way.The knee-jerk reaction to this news would be for me to cancel my **** account. Instead I'm going to post this letter on a few popular **** forums, and raise general public awareness of ****'s actions. I will continue to closely monitor ****'s actions, and may switch ISPs if it continues with this course of action.Yours Sincerely

"I commend the nation's cable operators for utilizing the National Cable and Telecommunications Association (NCTA) to negotiate and collectively enter into a unprecedented industry-wide agreement with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) to limit the availability of child pornography on the internet."

No agreement is, or ever was, necessary for any ISP to proceed forth to fight child pornography. The fact that some kind of mutual agreement is in place suggests something else is going on behind the scenes. Would NCMEC have prohibited ISPs from fighting against child pornography without an agreement? I doubt that. Maybe these ISPs knew all along they were part of the problem with child pornography? Or is NCMEC trying some more extensive shake-down tactics?

The big question will be just to how far will these ISPs go in the name of protecting children? Just how many will use it as a false excuse to shut off internet resources that have nothing to do with child pornography and were not even the victim of spammers of such content?

I was on Usenet two nights ago looking for a song in my vinyl collection that's in deep storage, and all the.alt.binaries groups I'm subscribed to were there (yes... even those, so stop with the jokes).

And yesterday AM when I logged on, they were gone, and and "Alt- 411 no such group" error appears instead.

All the other groups I'm subscribed to are still functioning.

I spent four hours on the phone attempting to "complain", and got the "standard" troubleshooting script more than a few times, before I politely interrupted one woman, and asked firmly to speak to her supervisor.

The bitch (oh, did I say that? Why YES, I did, in retrospect) put me on looooooong hold, then came back on the line and said with dripping sarcasm: "I'm so sorry for the loooong wait, here's your extension."... click...

After calling back I was again transferred several times by clueless people, dropped a couple more, and finally vented (nicely) on a poor 611 tech guy, the only human I could speak to who actually had technical knowledge.

And yes, dear friends, he was also completely clueless about the attacks on Usenet.

I'm now more angry that they have "insulated" themselves from humans with the endless phone tree.

Maybe I've naive, but how much "Child Pornography" is actually publicly available on the internet? (No links please, thanks)

I mean, I see PLENTY of "regular" or even crazy-weird porn online all the time, but I've NEVER accidentally or intentionally come across child porn. Are the distributors sophisticated enough to use private/encrypted systems, or do I just not crawl usenet enough? Seems like a fictional problem that sounds REALLY good to elected officials and families ("Yes, let's change to that ISP who blocks child porn, that will solve all of our problems, honey!")

I'm all for recovering exploited children and keeping them away from child molesters, but why do I not see a photo taken ten years ago and posted on the internet as a particularly heinous crime in this day and age?

Note... my ex GF was a cop and they (cops) ALL took particular pleasure in busting active child molesters/"public weenie-whackers". I liked to hear about them getting caught as well, and my GF said that 99 times out of 100, the suspect would be the biggest sissy on earth and start "crying for momma" as soon as they were even arrested (not CONVICTED...yet).

I think what we're really looking at here is the instrument by which P2P for the masses will be destroyed -- all in the name of "we must protect our precious little snowflakes!" -- and before anybody gets started on me, I am NOT a pedophile, child molestor, or sex offender of any type, and I am against all such activities and the people who perpetrate them. Still I assert that this, or something like it, is going to be the hammer that gets dropped on P2P. Think about it: If you're a pedophile, then you're insane to have your wares hosted on a web server somewhere that can be raided, and you arrested. You're better off using the Gnutella network and it's like, and BitTorrent, right? At least, it's plausible, and that's all they really need, is plausibility, because everybody knows that only dirty filthy criminals use P2P, right? Of course what will really happen is that like with anything else, their efforts will just drive the pedos deeper underground, and meanwhile P2P will likely have to evolve in a direction that likewise takes it out of the daylight and fairly deep underground, too -- because no matter what, you can't stop the signal, Mal..

If i'm not mistaken... this is the same as closing highways because criminals may use them for bank robbery escape routes.
this isnt about ending child porn, this has more to do with ending distribution routes used by people to destribute content themselves.
In other words, the major corporations behind these ISPs have an interest in dictating usage so that they are the single delivery system for content to their end users.
Child Porn is an excuse used to distract us from the real situation.
The newsgroups is not full of child porn... child porn is perhaps.005% of the porn on newsgroups.
The truth is... all of the good porn, tv shows, movies, music, etc etc are on the newsgroups... that means MASSIVE bandwidth usage.
The bandwidth used by child porn sick fucks, doesnt even compare to the bandwidth being used by jackers looking at "of legal age" material, or the file traders who are sending massive amounts of data through the newsgroups.
Kiddie porn is a fucking political power move. Dont fall victom of it. Its not a widespread issue.

From neighbour to neighbour. And to bridge longer distances, organize properly and ask a commercial telco (or whoever has cable in place) to simply lease a cable to us. I repeat, lease the cable. Not "provide connectivity".

That way I think we can get back the control of what's going through the cables. Thus "feeing the Internets".

Could this be the end of Eternal September? People serious about wanting usenet access can get a pay account to access it and all the spammers and riffraff that have plagued it since the mid 90's will be for the most part gone. Still there are a lot of downsides of this, but I don't think losing a piracy outlet is one of them. Have you seen the retention of most ISP's these days? They don't retain enough of anything to be worth much anymore. Their binary section usually has a size limit which means that unless you are collecting each piece as it comes in, if you log in, you only see about 1/4 of the last uploaded chunks of the file. And don't get me started on how much they throttle the usenet speed (I'm talking sub dialup speeds). Anyone who uses it for binary access is almost certainly using a pay site that has decent retention and good speed. That isn't going to go away from what I understand.

USENET services have been protected by common carrier status since they started; if you start censoring newsgroups, you become responsible for their content. this has been the way it is forever, and is commonly understood and supported in case law.

Several years ago the ISP Buffnet was successfully prosecuted for child pornography because the local prosecutor found child porn on the usenet, and Buffnet had usenet servers. Common carrier status didn't save them.

They aren't old school common carriers, but the safe harbor provision of the DMCA is very similar in scope and spirit with the old common carrier regulations. So long as they are only transporting the content and not deciding what is and is not shown then they are afforded broad immunity. Of course the same law requires them to censor content when they receive a request, so I don't think that this type of blocking would strip them of their protection. If it becomes an issue then this is one area where I think it would be very legitimate for the ISP's to lobby Congress for some legislative immunity.

"From what I gather, this is only the ISPs that have their own servers that are affected, and not independent usenet providers themselves (like Giganews)."

How long do you really think it's going to take for this to trickle over to premium USENET servers, if in no other way than to have their traffic as closely monitored, and potentially throttled, as that of P2P users?

*Any* time it's "for the children", you can be damn well sure that they'll be last on the list of those being served.